


Adrift in a World of my Own

by titC



Series: High Notes [3]
Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: A little whump, F/M, canonically presumed dead character, dragon - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-04 17:35:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25400236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/titC/pseuds/titC
Summary: Matt suspects Elektra isn't quite your regular kind of ghost...
Relationships: Matt Murdock/Elektra Natchios
Series: High Notes [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1823374
Comments: 4
Kudos: 22
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo, Marvel Fluff Bingo, Marvel Undercover 2020, Mattelektra Bingo.





	Adrift in a World of my Own

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thank you to [PixelByPixel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PixelByPixel/pseuds/PixelByPixel) for the beta!
> 
> Written for Marvel Undercover 2020, from the (self) prompt _The Great Pretender_ sung by [The Platters](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2t21IMMSbU) or [Freddie Mercury](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLRjFWDGs1g) among others... also the soundtrack of Matt "I'm fine" Murdock's life!
> 
> Also fills my Marvel Fluff Bingo prompt _sleeping under the stars_ , my MattElektra Bingo prompt _back in black_ , my Bad Things Happen Bingo prompt _left for dead_.

Elektra had always expected to die young.

She’d been raised to be a soldier, but even when she’d been sent to be adopted by the Natchios family it had been more a loan than a true adoption. Her parents had got a child, one they’d wanted and that would incidentally make her father look good in his political career, but it had always been understood she’d be called back to the Chaste one day or another. She’d learned to play the rich heiress, learned to dance as well as she could fight, learned more languages, learned how to do business and how to hide her ruthlessness and skills under a veneer of money and charm.

But the life she’d been raised for didn’t lend itself to a long, quiet existence.

She’d always known that she’d never be old and frail, that one day a particular fight would be her last.

She’d made her peace with it long ago; she loved fighting. She loved the thrill of living on the edge and knowing it could end at any moment, that every day could be her last. It made life all the sharper; everything was brighter because its flame could be snuffed on her next breath.

She’d never wanted to die, but she’d never feared death. Not until the day she died, right when another life – another Elektra, even – had suddenly been in her grasp. She’d wanted to _live_ then, truly and fully, to try out all the possibilities that called to her. But she’d chosen death for Matthew’s sake, jumping in front of a blade meant for him. Because she loved him, and because she wanted to live with him, she’d chosen to die herself rather than see him dead.

She couldn't have borne it.

So, she died. But Matthew lived.

On her second birth, clawing her way out of a red-blood-filled stone womb or maybe casket, she hadn’t thought much about anything. Get out, fight, fight. Life, death – those had been meaningless, until she started to remember… shadows, at first. But then the shadows solidified, and she remembered herself. Stick. Matthew. The Hand, the Chaste, and freedom. And she decided that this life would be fully hers, that no one would ever again tell her what to do. Who she was.

But right as the last shadows solidified in her mind, Midland Circle collapsed over them.

And she died again.

She was in some sort of limbo now, something formless and colourless and very, very boring. Nothing hurt, nothing shone, nothing… nothing. It was just a lot of nothing, and Elektra hated this emptiness. She wondered at first if she was still alive but buried under rubble, but then she’d have felt, well, something. Pain, a crushing weight, thirst… but no, there was nothing.

Nothing, until a sharp pain where her heart should have been jolted her out of the endless merry-go-round of her thoughts. She suddenly felt freezing cold and fear and determination, then numbness. She found herself on the shore of a lake, Matthew drowning in front of her, and she knew what she had to do.

The frustration of being unable to touch him almost suffocated her, but the ghost she (probably) was now didn’t need to breathe. _Matthew_ did, and he needed to be dry and warm and elsewhere. She realized living things could see and maybe hear her, sort of; and she darted around and made a bird squawk and a fox scramble after it and, finally, found two men close by. They probably didn’t see much more than a vague silhouette, but added to the animals’ ruckus it was enough to rouse their curiosity and get them to Matthew.

She followed from a distance, watching them take him in, strip his wet clothes from him, and wrap him up in dry blankets near a warm stove. She wished she could feel the warmth of it; the cold didn’t really register, but knowing it was there was enough to make her crave heat. She suspected what she’d felt right before being yanked to Matthew were his own sensations, and even if they’d been brief and rather unpleasant she’d felt alive for a too-short moment. But now, it had all faded. Well, she’d never been one for cold anyway.

She waited until he was alone before making her presence known to him. Speaking with Matthew, trying and failing to touch his cheek but still seeing him react to her when his skin pebbled, when he shivered… she was cold, to him. If she could have fought someone – anyone, God himself if that was what it took – to have a body again, she would have, a thousand times over.

But she could feel her presence in the land of the living grow even fainter; shapes blurred around her and sounds became muffled. She held on until Matthew was asleep and wished she could make the golden cross he’d flung to the other end of the room come back to him, but she knew she couldn’t. Her last memory of that night was watching it intently, willing it to come back to Matthew.

And then she was back in the void.

The second time she saw Matthew, the crucifix was back around his neck. She could see it glint on his skin, but it didn’t really matter then. What actually mattered was what he was going through. It had happened a few times, two or three maybe, back when they’d been students. She hadn’t known what to do then, so she’d just sat next to him on her couch and rubbed his back with one hand as she read. She’d got in touch with Stick afterwards, and he’d said it was just another way Matthew was weak and not fully trained.

But she understood now, after a brief flash of overwhelming violence that she guessed came from Matthew, that it was his hypersensitive senses going haywire, and that the surge of electricity in the entire neighbourhood was affecting him. She could see the billboard outside flickering strangely, cycling through colours faster than it should from what she could see reflected on the main room floor. People in other buildings were turning lights on and off as if to check they were working again, and she could guess Matthew could sense all the sudden onslaught of activity after a period of quiet.

The heater clicked behind her as it (she could only assume) rose in temperature.

The quiet must have been cold, too. Cold and quiet: that was what death felt like. It wasn’t what she wanted for him, even if it seemed he was courting death, sometimes. But she wouldn't allow it. However much she wanted to touch him, feel him, she would do everything in her power to keep him alive and as far away as possible from the cold, empty void.

She told him to be kinder to himself, pretended she could feel his hair when she ran her fingers through it. She remembered it well, and pretending would have to be enough. Once she was settled behind him she threw an arm around his waist and wished she could do more. She wanted him to feel her just as much as she wanted to feel him, but it was not to be.

But maybe – maybe – she could be around him at times when he wasn’t in grave danger or pain, when she could tease him and remind him to enjoy life, too. It would be, she knew, quite stalker-like, but then again she was a ghost now. So she would haunt him, as was proper for a ghost. She just had to find a way to be near him more, but she’d manage it.

Once she had a goal in mind, nothing could ever stop her. This would be no different… or so she thought. Because right then, a deep, slow voice filled her head:

_I will grant you life again, human._

And she knew things wouldn’t go as she’d planned.

* * *

Matt woke up all warm and cozy, and missing the cold presence of Elektra’s soul. The heat was on, life was buzzing and bustling around him – cars honking and people shouting outside, the trains rumbling on tracks underground… 7:51 am, his alarm clock said. He’d overslept a bit, but nothing too bad.

He got up and walked to the window, resting a hand and his forehead against the cold glass. The streets must have been cleared enough that regular activities could resume; the sounds were clearer, less muffled by snow. He’d be able to go out and be a better Daredevil that night, but first he had to call Foggy, make sure they were opening the office again, and get ready for the day.

“Electricity!” Foggy welcomed him. “Ain’t it grand? I swear, we forget how much we rely on it.”

Matt hummed his agreement into his coffee and let Foggy go on about the TV cutting off in the middle of the show he and Marci had been watching, being unable to cook anything, and having to choose between facing the many, many steps down to the streets (and then back up to their apartment) in the hopes of _perhaps_ finding food, or making do with some cold cuts and bread.

“What did you go for, then?” Matt asked.

“A good old ham sandwich, of course. We didn’t even know if any takeout place was still open; we weren’t about to take the risk. So we had a picnic in the kitchen, as one does.”

“Marci doesn’t strike me as a picnic gal.”

“She’s a woman of adventure and wilderness, Matty. I’ll have you know she was barefoot in the kitchen.”

“Uh huh.”

“Anyway, what about you? Did you have anything to eat or was your fridge only full of beer and frozen peas?”

“I was fine,” Matt replied automatically.

And of course, Foggy picked up on it. “That isn’t quite what I asked, buddy. Don’t tell me you haven’t had anything since the other night.”

“No, no, I’ve eaten.” A breakfast of cold takeout from the previous evening with Foggy, and then… uh. Maybe he’d skipped lunch, and then dinner. And breakfast. He’d been busy, and this morning he’d been almost late; no big deal. He was fine.

“…right.” There was a soft sound; Foggy was shaking his head. “I’m shaking my head at you, pal,” he said. Matt didn’t tell him he knew that he was growing his hair out again, finally. Matt had always liked it long; it was _Foggy_ and also made it easier to know what gestures Foggy was making.

“So, what’s on our plate for today? We’ve got Mr. Nuñez at 11 on the menu, right?”

“Ye, we do… wait. _On our_ – are you branching out from blind jokes into puns, now?”

Matt grinned and headed to his own desk, proud to have deflected Foggy’s worry for now.

Of course, he found himself forcibly dragged to lunch. It was just the two of them since Karen was digging into the court’s archives for the day, both for the firm and her side gig with Jessica.

“You’re devouring that thing like you’re really hungry, you know?”

Matt frowned and put his sandwich back down on the plate. “It’s lunchtime,” he said.

“Uh huh.”

“What?”

“You’re making the brave, wounded duck face again.”

“I’m not!” Matt pointed a finger at Foggy for good measure. “And what, I’m not handsome anymore?”

“Jeez, sorry; you’re a brave, wounded, _and yet still handsome_ duck. Better?”

“Much,” Matt replied as primly as he could. He picked his sandwich up again and focused on it, and Foggy let him be for a while.

However, as soon as they were out of the coffee shop and walking back to the office, he started again.

“Look, you know you can talk to me, yeah? You know what happens when we don’t talk.”

Matt sighed. “I’m fine.”

“You’re not. You’re good at faking it, but you can’t fool _me_ , buddy. She’s on your mind, isn’t she?”

Well, yes. “I think,” Matt said carefully, “that she’s not…” He shook his head. “Let’s take this inside, okay?”

“Sure.” Foggy wasn’t about to let it go though; he could be like a dog with a bone sometimes. That was what made him such a good lawyer, but sometimes Matt just wanted to lick his wounds in private. Still, he owed too much to Foggy.

Once they were back behind the familiar walls of Nelson and Murdock, they sat on the old couch that Foggy’s mother had given them for their waiting room, and Matt tried to put his feelings into words.

“I can’t know for sure, of course, but…” His cane was still cold under his fingertips, but it was also hard and unyielding. Nothing at all like Elektra’s intangible touch. He wondered, not for the first time, if she could feel the heat or the cold as she was now.

“Matt.” Foggy’s voice was coming from far away.

“Uh, yeah. Sorry. Yeah, so I think… she’s not quite dead. She can’t be, Foggy.”

“Okay.” Matt felt a wave of gratitude for Foggy, who didn’t immediately dismiss what had to sound like wishful thinking more than anything else. “What makes you say that?”

“She came back last night.”

“Huh.” A pause. “I’m raising my eyebrows. Was anything different?”

“I think so. It was like she could interact with the world a little; we spoke but also she… made things quiet. I could feel her, almost.”

“Almost?”

“There was cold, like the first time.” Matt leaned back against the cushions. “But… I think I could feel her arms around me, before I fell asleep. I could feel their weight. A soul doesn’t have any weight, Foggy. Well, I don’t think they do…?”

“Hm.” A deep breath, then: “What do you plan to do, then?”

“I need to find her body. Maybe she’s just… detached from it? Maybe she’s still alive somewhere, but in a coma? Maybe… no. It’s stupid. A building fell on us; she can’t have survived that.”

“You did.”

“I was lucky. And it was a year ago; she should be either fully alive or dead by now.”

“Danny’s company’s got the rights on the work site, right? They’re still clearing it out.”

“Yeah.”

“You should call and tell him about it then. He’ll know if they’ve found her body, and he knows about magic stuff too. Maybe he can help you out on this one.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Matt hadn’t spoken to Danny since Midland Circle, and he wasn’t looking forward to it. What did one say in those circumstances? _So I lived after all, but never had the guts to get in touch?_ Or maybe, _Thanks for taking care of the city for me? Hey, heard you went through some stuff too, sucks to be us, right?_ What about, _So hey, remember my ex who wanted to kill us all? Turns out she might be a ghost, or not. Wanna help?_

Yeah, it was going to go down swell. But Foggy was right; what did he have to lose?

So he thanked him, and they left the couch, and went back to work.

It mattered, too. The living of Hell’s Kitchen needed them.

Matt stood in front of the dojo’s door for a while. He could hear Danny inside; his heartbeat was slow enough that Matt figured he was probably meditating. Or sleeping. Okay, he couldn’t stay outside like a coward forever; he had to go in and confront Danny. Okay, no, not confront; _talk_ to him. Like a… friend, he supposed. That had fallen off the face of the earth then come back. No big deal.

He stepped in and at first choked on the incense; he hadn’t realized it would be so strong inside. Once he’d stopped coughing, he realized a window had been opened and that Danny was standing in front of him, fidgeting a little. He wanted to go for a hug but didn’t dare, Matt deduced from the awkward arm-waving and foot-shuffling that stopped right when Danny got within reach. Matt’s _noli me tangere_ vibes had to be particularly strong right then.

“Matt!”

“Hey,” Matt managed between coughs. “Long time no see.”

Some hand-waving through the air, probably about the incense. “Sorry about that; if I’d known you were coming I wouldn't have burned that one. Want some water? Or tea? Maybe water’s better, yeah?”

“I’m fine; don’t worry.”

“I do, you know. Worry.”

“I’m sorry. I, uh, heard you got through some hard times recently?”

“Yeah, but I’m back here for now.” A pause. “So are you. Man, I’m glad to see you alive and well. You are, right? Well, I mean.”

“I’m fine.”

Danny turned away to go do something in the kitchenette and called back. “Come in! I’m trying to find – ah, there. Love these babies. Green tea okay?”

In the space of a few breaths, Matt found himself sitting cross-legged on the floor, tea in one hand and some sort of flaky cookie in the other, listening to Danny’s chatter about the dojo, Colleen, Claire, Luke… Danny was filling the silence, but it was comfortable. He wasn’t expecting Matt to contribute much, as if he’d seen Matt needed a little time to compose himself.

“So,” Danny said after yet another wild tale, “that’s it for me. What about you? I’ve got so many questions! Jessica filled me in a bit, said you survived after all, reappeared a few months later and took down Fisk, so I figured you had to be busy, right?”

Matt should tell him about Nelson and Murdock 2.0, about how sorry he was he hadn't kept in touch and how grateful for the second chance he’d been given. He should apologize for not coming sooner, promise he’d be better at the friend thing, ask about the cat he could tell lived in the dojo… “Elektra’s alive,” he blurted out instead.

Danny didn’t say anything for a moment. It was very novel.

“I mean, I’m not sure, but her ghost’s been visiting me and I think she can interact with the environment a little bit more each time. That’s not what ghosts do, right?”

“I’m not a ghost expert,” Danny replied, wary.

“Right, yeah, I know. But Foggy said, you still own the rights to the Midland Circle site, yes?”

“I do.”

“Did you… find anything?”

“Anything… like her body?”

Matt nodded. He didn’t _want_ to think of her lifeless body; he’d held it once before and it was already one time too many.

“No, but the site’s clearing out has stopped for now. The workers were worried about more collapse and the risk of dangerous chemicals; we’ve sent teams to reevaluate the risks.”

Oh. “How deep…?”

“Uh, only the garage levels; once we get further down there will be NDAs and such. I don’t know, Ward’s dealing with all this, not me. Do you think she’s still there? Alive?”

“She’s tough.” He didn’t say that whatever procedure the Hand had done to her had probably made her even harder to kill; Danny was aware. He’d fought her too, found out first-hand about her slightly superhuman abilities.

“Right. Well, we can go there, if you’d like? But… what if you’re right?”

“I just need to know.”

“Maybe we’ll find her body. What do we do then?”

Matt smiled a little. “Never pegged you as a make-a-plan-first guy.” He would like to say that she’d be given a proper burial, but he’d done that once before and look what had happened to her. “If she’s alive…” If she was alive, she might still be dying, or trying to kill them both, or amnesiac. “I have to make sure. But you don’t have to come.” She and Danny had had unpleasant encounters, after all, and he might not want to have anything to do with her. Matt couldn't blame him.

“I’ll be there with you and we’ll be ready, whatever happens. Man, doing stuff together again – that’s great, right?”

Matt hid his face behind his tea instead of answering. He hadn’t wanted to drag Danny into this, and he shouldn’t have to rely on outside help – Stick would have been appalled – but he had to face the fact he had limits, whether he liked it or not. (Not.) He couldn't trust himself to fight her if she was alive and back to what the Hand had tried to make of her, and if they didn’t find anything – or worse, if they found some _thing_ – he wasn’t sure what he’d do. Having someone along who could stop him from making very bad decisions couldn't be wrong, even if Danny wasn’t the best at decisions. At least he could take either Elektra or Matt in a fight, if it came to that.

So Matt nodded, finished his tea, and didn’t protest too much when Danny insisted he go to his apartment first so he could put on his night job gear and especially his mask before they met back at Midland Circle. The Man in the Mask wouldn’t raise as many eyebrows as a blind lawyer there if they were spotted, especially since Daredevil and Danny were already linked to it.

It was logical, the right thing to do, but Matt still hated the delay now his mind was made up.

So he dutifully walked back home, grateful the sidewalks had been mostly cleared of snow but still wary of ice patches, and changed into his Daredevil clothes. Thermals first, of course, thick-soled boots, the ropes, the mask, then he took to the roofs.

Danny was already there when he reached the site, so Matt jumped down to stand next to him.

“Haven’t been back since,” he said.

Danny squeezed his shoulder and uncharacteristically kept quiet. Well, maybe he’d learned that too, lately. Matt followed him until they got to a padlocked door, and Danny produced a key.

“We could have climbed over that.”

“Hey, my name’s on this place; I’m making use of the perks, you know?”

“Lock’s going to be frozen anyway.”

“You’re a glass half-empty kinda guy, but you forget I’m the Immortal Iron Fist.” He said it with a smile, as if he was in on the joke now. “That means I can… fist the lock.”

Matt made a strangled sound.

“Yeah, you know, warm it up, loosen it a bit, work out the kinks so that I can slide the key in and hit the right spot and…”

“ _Danny!_ Aren’t you a monk or something?”

“Or something, that’s right. Jeez, I knew you were Catholic but you don't have to be such a tight-assed Catholic grandma!” The lock clicked open and Danny made short work of the chain that held the doors shut. “There you go, granny.”

“Ugh.” But Matt felt his lips twitch and heard Danny chuckle as he walked past him to enter the site.

He paused inside, listening to Danny push the doors closed before widening his focus around himself. He had no clear memories of what had happened, just… flashes of sensations, of violent emotions. Elektra, relief, bombs, knowing it was the end, joy they were together, thanking God, dust and the peculiar smell of those dragon bones, damp rock, blood, crashes, tumbling down, Elektra torn away from him, his empty arms, his empty hands, falling, crushed, broken, deafened, pain, hurt, confusion, his lungs unable to expand, his legs unable to move, his body unresponsive, his throat raw, he was fire, he was on fire, he was ashes, he was –

“Matt? Hey, Matt?” His name got through the fog around him. From the urgency in Danny’s voice, he’d been trying for a while.

“Yeah, I’m good.” He rubbed his head; he could feel a headache coming.

“Sure you are. Look, I can go search for her on my own, if you’d rather…”

“Where’s the shaft down? Is it still open?”

“… or I can make more dirty jokes?”

“Please don’t.” He appreciated Danny’s efforts to cheer him up, but he wasn’t up to listening to more right now; his head was killing him already.

“Aw. And yeah, the shaft was cleared enough for people to get down, but there’s a palm print scanner.”

“ _Your_ palm print?”

“Absolutely.”

They headed for a low building in the middle of the site, prefab offices or something similar. “I appreciate your being here,” Matt said.

“Because of my stellar comedy routine or my magic palm print?”

Matt smiled. “Both. But really,” he went on, “I’m glad I’m not on my own here.”

Danny opened a door, then another, then they were near a closed-off area: the actual shaft drilled through Manhattan's ancient rock bed. Couldn't be anything else. “I’m glad to be here,” he said, then put his hand against a flat surface: the scanner, Matt guessed.

There was a hiss, a puff of warm air, then the door swung open and they stepped in.

Matt was immediately thrown back to that night; the smell, the damp, the… underground-ness of it. He remembered it got much worse the further down you went. “Let’s do this, then,” he said, more for himself than Danny.

“The elevator’s not working, obviously, but we can rappel down; ropes and harnesses are just to our right.”

There was a sickly-sweet smell coming up the shaft, carried on a rotten-egg-stench breeze coming from below. Elektra had smelled like that when she’d been reborn, but the nauseating sickly-sweet had faded with time. She’d only smelled of herself at the very end, of human sweat and blood, of leather oil and sharp metal. But now there was no sign of her and the pounding in his head was worsening, getting almost as bad as that one truly epic bender in college.

Once geared up they made quick work of going down, and after slipping out of their harnesses, Matt opened his senses as wide as he could. He wasn’t sure what he could find; was Elektra even here? Would it be her body, or would she be alive? The air was thick with water down there, and he tried not to think of what would happen to a corpse in such an environment. He could smell the decay. There had been other people trapped underground, other bodies.

“We’re not as far down as we were then, right?”

“No; there’s still a lot of debris, rocks, and concrete before we get to that level. We’re just under the lower garage floors, I think.”

“This is pointless. We can’t…”

“Oh, we can. As I said, there are perks to having my name on this site. Oh, and to being, well, me.”

“Don’t tell me about the Immortal Iron Fist again.”

“Fine, I won’t.” Danny… powered up? was it the right word? his fists, both of them. “I was given these by a dragon, and they will lead me to the dragon under our feet.”

The way the air was ionized around Danny’s hands, the growing and coiled power… Matt gritted his teeth. It wasn’t helping the headache, but he needed to know.

“Lead on,” he said.

“Okay, so hold on tight; I’ve never done this before. It’s exciting, really!”

With these not-quite reassuring words, Danny stepped right next to Matt and waited until Matt resigned himself to hugging Danny, then everything went fast and loud and strange. It felt like the rock melted under them and reformed right as they’d gone through, as if they were in a little bubble of their own zipping through schist; Matt’s sense of where he was relating to the world around him melted along with the rock and he swallowed back the bile creeping up his throat.

Finally, they were spat out in a strangely echoing chamber; the air felt drier here, but the sulfur and cloying smells were stronger. Matt stumbled away from Danny and leaned a hand against the nearest wall, breathing through his nose and trying to focus on his surroundings and not the sourness in his mouth or the power drills busy in his skull.

“You look… too pale and too green at the same time,” Danny said.

“Yeah.” Yeah, he definitely felt like those colors, even if he wasn’t sure he remembered them. “I’m fine, let’s do this.” He tried not to think of the weight of everything above them, threatening to crush them at any moment; he tried not to think of the way out. If there was one. He wasn’t sure he was up for the same trick again, but he guessed there wouldn't be many other escape routes.

His stomach more or less settled and under control, he expanded his senses around. Bones, rock, concrete, dust and gravel, Danny’s steady heartbeat and… and…

“What’s that?”

“What’s what?”

Matt pointed ahead of him. “That thing.”

“That’s the dragon’s skull.”

“It should be under us.” Matt thought he could smell bone, but he’d assumed it was… other bones. Not the dragon’s.

“Well… yeah, you’re right.” A scraping sound and a burst of heated air, and Danny jumped up to stand between Matt and the skull. “Whoa!”

“It’s not… it’s not moving, right?” It _was_ according to Matt’s senses, but the skeletons of dead dragons were not supposed to. He hoped.

“Uuum…”

Matt went to stand next to Danny, gritting his teeth against the stench of sulfur and his blinding headache. Good thing he was already blind, right?

The skull was above the cave floor, and a regular hissing sound came from it; it was breathing somehow and it exhaled searing puffs if air. Matt could discern no heartbeat, but there were some clicking sounds like – he hated to even think it – bones knocking into each other. Oh God, and there were more bones by the second, bones popping out of the floor and adding to the dragon and… “What’s happening? It doesn’t make sense.”

“Whatever it is you think is happening, is happening.”

“So, a dragon skeleton is… pulling itself through the rock?”

“Yeah. I think it’s getting through the rock in the same way we came down.”

Sometimes people mocked him for his Catholic faith, but this? This was much, much worse. “So we’re going to fight a dragon?”

“It’s not behaving aggressively so far, just… okay, it’s almost entirely out now.”

There was a final squelchy sound and the pounding in Matt’s head reached new heights. Through the pain that threatened to engulf his senses, he could tell the skull was getting lower, until it came to rest on the cave floor with the grating of bone on rock. Matt locked his knees and refused to show weakness by leaning on Danny.

 _You have dragon in you_ , a deep gravelly voice said directly in Matt’s head, and he couldn't help the stumble this time.

“Hey Matt, you alright?” Danny asked as he gripped his biceps.

“I’m fine. Uh, did you hear that?”

“Oh, you heard it too?”

Matt nodded. “It said I, we, have dragon in ourselves. It doesn’t make sense.” He was losing it; being underground and the overpowering smells and his headache were making him hallucinate… he was going to wake up in his bed in a minute. All this was a nightmare; yes, that made for a much better explanation. More rational, more… yeah, just better.

_You are not hallucinating, human._

This time the pressure in his skull made Matt fall to his knees. Danny was the Iron Fist, punched a dragon and everything, but Matt?

“Matt, your nose is bleeding. Did you punch yourself when I wasn’t watching?”

Ha, no. “Headache,” he gritted out.

 _The Iron Fist has dragon power in him, and you have breathed the dust from my bones._ _I healed you, human._

His head felt about to explode, and it was taking all his willpower not to throw up everything he'd eaten in the past year; _healed_ didn’t quite cut it.

“You’re hurting him,” Danny said.

“Are you antagonizing the dragon skull?” Matt forced out.

_Ah, you are one of them, those whose senses dragons overwhelm. I apologize, human._

Matt very carefully did _not_ take a deep breath, but waved a hand. He didn’t want to try even a slow nod.

_I have one of your kin with me, one who breathed the dust from my bones, too. One who has dragon inside and whom I returned to life._

It was hard to say if the confusion came more from his headache or from everything else. “Danny?”

“Uh, the skull is opening its jaws and… whoa!”

Matt tried to focus through the haze of pain, but – “Elektra?”

“Shit, it’s really her!”

“Matthew,” and her voice came with the right resonance, air and sound traveling through lungs and throat and mouth. “And… you.”

Her footsteps echoed on the walls and she smelled like a human body; he could hear her hair brush against her clothes, her skin. She knelt in front of Matt and cupped his cheek.

“The dragon is overwhelming, I know. But well-meaning.”

“Elektra,” Matt repeated. There was no other word at his disposal in that very moment, no other syllables in his mind. “Elektra.”

_Farewell, humans. My grave will be deep enough my bones won’t be found again._

Elektra turned away from Matt. “May you have a peaceful rest, dragon.”

The pressure inside Matt’s skull started to diminish, although the smell of sulfur increased. The squelchy sounds and the clicking started up again; Matt guessed the dragon was melting back into the rock, and he could feel that both Danny’s and Elektra’s attentions were on it. Their faces were turned in that direction; they all held their breaths until it was over, and then Matt found he could stand up.

“You’re alive? You’re really alive?”

She took his mask off and let him feel her palm on his skin. “I am. Nothing could keep me away from life, Matthew. There are too many things I’d miss.”

“Uh, not murder, I hope?” Danny asked. “I mean – last time, you were… you know. Not quite right in the head.”

“I am myself,” she snapped.

Now he wasn’t stuck somewhere between about to pass out and about to throw up, Matt was starting to think more clearly. He could tell Elektra wasn’t feeling as cool and collected as she was projecting; her heart was beating too fast and he could smell the adrenaline in her blood. Her fingers were ever-so-slightly shaking against his skin, so he wrapped them in his hand and squeezed.

“We’re alive,” he said. “We’ve got another chance.” He probably looked like an idiot, given the grin he could feel growing and growing on his face. He didn’t really care; she was real and alive and he could touch her again.

“We’re also far underground,” Danny said, “but I think I can get us out if I focus on _away_ rather than _closer_ like before.”

And the idea of fresh air on his face, of not having the weight of the earth pushing down right above his head… Matt couldn't wait.

Elektra never fully warmed back to a regular human temperature. She was always a bit cool, and she seemed to hate the cold even more than before. Matt decided it meant they had to keep warm in many interesting ways to compensate, and she wholeheartedly agreed. Foggy liked to tease him about his… _glow_ , he called it, and about the pictures on the internet that showed two figures dressed all in black jumping from roof ledge to fire escape. Karen had confirmed he looked particularly _satisfied_. “And,” she’d added, “suspiciously bruise-free.”

Well, he wasn’t; it was just the bruises were on the parts he kept under his clothes. He sparred and trained with Elektra (bruises); they took to the roofs of Hell’s Kitchen most nights (not as many bruises as before), and when they got back to his apartment she would take some time to enjoy the wide night sky (no bruises at all).

At first she only stayed a few minutes on the roof before going inside, but as the weather warmed she stayed longer and longer. Matt took to bringing back a blanket or two and warm drinks so they’d sip their tea sitting close together, Elektra looking up at the sky and Matt letting the sounds of the city at night wrap around him. It was, he found, a good way to remind himself of how free they were, now. There was nothing between them and the sky; it was vast and eternal and, up there on the roof, almost close enough to touch.

“Matthew,” Elektra said one night, late in May. They were back from not a night out chasing traffickers and dealers, for once, but a night out on the town with a particularly good dinner and great wine.

“Mm.”

“Matthew, I want to go to Central Park.”

“Okay.”

“Right now.”

“It’s closed.”

She scoffed. “And?”

“Why do you want to go there?”

“I want to watch the stars with grass tickling my neck; I want to fall asleep with the moon watching over us.”

“In Central Park.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Why not?”

He smiled into her neck; that was a very Elektra answer. She wanted to, and therefore she would. “Okay, then.”

Thermos in hand, they made quick work of getting in the park and finding a good spot to lay down their blankets. They were quiet for a long time; he knew she was watching the stars and he was listening to her, to the park around them, to the city around the park. She, of course, was the center of it all.

“I’m leaving New York next week,” she said so low he wondered if she hadn’t meant for him to hear. But no, she knew him too well to make such a mistake.

“Why?” he whispered back.

“You know me; I can’t stay anywhere forever. And I need to settle some things in Greece; I’ve done what I could from here but this so-I’m-back-from-the-dead- _again_ business looks very shady.”

“Oh.” _Will you come back?_ He didn’t dare ask.

“You could come with me.”

“I have a job here; I can’t drop it at a moment’s notice.”

“I know; I’m just… wishing for things.”

Matt took her hand and didn’t reply.

“Perhaps another time. We could go on a holiday somewhere warm, just you and me; drive fast cars with the top down and eat ribs with our fingers in roadside diners…”

“I’m not driving,” he said.

“I’m not planning for a Jesus-take-the-wheel sort of holiday, Matthew. I want to drive like a bat out of hell. As soon as I’m done in Greece… We could go anywhere there still are Hand or Chaste people; we could get rid of them and – ”

“ _Get rid of them?_ ”

“I want revenge. I have done what I could here in New York, but I know there are other cells.”

“People who were never fully trained, who were fresh recruits who didn’t even know what it was they’d joined.”

She raised herself on an elbow to look down at him; he could tell from her angry puffs of air. “What am I supposed to do, Matthew; let them grow their cults again?”

“You could… dissuade them.”

“I’m not good at speeches, but you are. Come with me.”

“Maybe.”

It seemed to be enough for now, and she lay back down, her arms crossed behind her head. Matt could hear the blood flowing through her veins, her heart still pumping in spite of everything.

“Were you really dead?” he asked. “Or did we all think you were?”

“I don’t know, and I’m not sure I want to. But I’m here now; I am back outside and free. No one is trapping me underground or with their lies, and it won’t happen again. Ever. That’s what matters to me. I don’t look to the past, Matthew.”

“And yet you want revenge on people vaguely affiliated with those who took your liberty from you.”

“Because it feels good.”

“And then? What then, when they’re all dead?”

“Does it matter now? It’s far into the future.”

“Don't go after them; keep an eye on them in case they try anything but… practice what you preach; live in the now.” He could feel the waves of skepticism coming from her, but he’d try again later. He got her thirst for revenge, but whoever remained had to be kids, like she’d been so long ago. He doubted reminding her of her own childhood would help right now, so he put it aside for the moment. “Lots of things to do now.”

She straddled him in one quick movement and leaned forward. “Any idea about where to start?”

He put his hands on her hips and said, “Oh, plenty.”

And they had the rest of their lives to work on them all.


End file.
